All Good Things
by jetplanejane
Summary: Michael was supposed to be Sara's happy ending, but then something happens that changes everything. Michael/Sara, Kellerman/Sara. AU.


_A/N: Part 3 of the "Secrets and Confessions" series._

_Content warning: mentions of terminal illness and character death._

* * *

Even out here in rural Montana, Paul Kellerman would have had a police-escorted motorcade and an entourage of bodyguards and aides. That was last week, before he found about Sara. Today he's retired and it's just him and the driver. Paul closes his eyes, the holographic news report's pastel hues flickering across his features.

"…_this follows President Kellerman's shock resignation a week ago."_

He dozes off, waking at the sound of tires crunching on gravel. Unnecessarily, the driver informs him that they've arrived.

The property is tucked away on the edge of the woods bordering a mirror lake, its surface painted with the reflection of an ancient glacier and fall birch trees. She fell in love with him in a place like this. It was late Spring and she took Mikey swimming. He remembers how hot her skin felt when he pressed his palm to her forehead. And when she kissed him, he didn't know if it was because of the sunstroke or the tequila or just because she wanted to.

A man, twenty-two and prematurely serious, is standing in the porch as the car pulls to a stop outside the sprawling house. It's eerie just how much he looks like Michael: tall and handsome, with a shock of dark, wavy hair. If he were still a kid, Paul and Sara would be arguing about it.

"_He needs a haircut. It looks untidy."_

"_He's in second grade, Paul, not the Army. Anyway, lucky for him, you don't have a say."_

"_I think I've earned a say."_

"_You've _earned?_ Because you put a ring on my finger? He's still a Scofield. He's still Michael's son, _not_ yours."_

She never let him forget that. But Mikey? Mikey never let Paul forget what he meant to him.

"Hey, Dad." Not Paul or step-dad. _Dad_.

"Mikey." Paul pulls the young man into a hug. "How you holding up?"

"You know, okay."

He might look like his father, but Mikey's got his mother's eyes and her strength. "Where's your sister?"

"With mom, upstairs."

* * *

_Seventeen years previously_

Upstairs. That's where Paul finds Mikey – all of four-and-a-half years old – curled up on his parents' bed with his arm around the Irish terrier cross, Chicken.

"_The dog's name is 'Chicken'?" Paul asks._

"_LJ and Mikey said he followed them home for the park," Sara explains. "But I found a fried chicken wing in Mikey's pocket. I think I know what he followed."_

Gently, he scoops up the little boy and carries him to his room. Chicken follows, tail wagging. After he tucks Mikey in, Paul sees Sara standing in the doorway, her jaw set in anger. Her reaction perplexes him; he doesn't understand that he's reminding her of what she lost only three months ago.

He steps into the hall, shutting the bedroom door behind him. "Sara, what's going on?"

"You can't do that, you can't put him to bed. You are not his father and he is _not_ your son."

"I'm not stupid, Sara," he reminds her, mildly annoyed. "You've had a long day. I was just trying to help."

"I've had a lot of long days, so don't. Don't come here and think that you can replace Michael."

_Replace Michael?_ "Okay, I don't think anything like that. Why would you even…? All I did was put him to bed. I'm being a friend here, it's got nothing to do with me wanting to 'replace Michael'." Whatever the fuck that means. "Did you invite me here just to pick a fight with me? Tell me what you want from me, Sara, because I don't know anymore."

She wants him to drive her to a diner and sit her down in a booth with a cup of scalded coffee. She wants him to get Michael on the phone and lecture him. "_Why'd you die, Michael? Why'd you leave them?"_

It's the one thing he can't give her: a happy ending. Michael was supposed to be her happy ending.

* * *

The next time he's over for dinner, he respects her boundaries. While she's putting Mikey to bed, he grabs a couple of beers out the fridge and waits for her in the porch.

"How are you finding early retirement?" she asks, when she joins him.

He hands her a beer. "Disillusioning. I thought I'd feel good about it. I did the right thing. But I still feel like a traitor to my government and my country."

"You didn't impeach Caroline Reynolds, the House of Representatives did."

"If I hadn't come forward, testified before a grand jury –"

"She'd still be screwing the American people over. I hear they want you to write a book and run for office."

He looks at her like how the hell did she know. "Kristine told you."

She tucks her legs into a half lotus position – her knee resting on his thigh – and smiles against the rim of the bottle as she takes a sip. "Girls talk."

"My _sister_ talks. And I'm not writing a book or running for office. I'm thinking of running _away,_ actually."

"Doesn't sound like you."

"I've changed, Sara." Washington changed him. "A buddy of mine has a lake cabin not far from here…spend a few days up there."

She chuckles, tugging on the rough sandpaper-stubble skin beneath his chin (he's not as trim as he used to be). "Well, you look the part…mountain man."

"Mountain man?" She's different tonight; relaxed and a little playful – light dancing on the surface of the sadness that has been swirling beneath her smile since Michael's death. He wants to tell her how beautiful she is, but she might think he still has a thing for her. She'd be right.

"Tell me a secret," Sara prompts, eventually.

_I'm still in love with you. _No, not that. He stalls, "You first."

She's a long-time answering, but when she does it's as if she's surprised by the sound of her own voice. "I feel like I'm supposed to be handling this – Michael – better? It's been almost a year, but…" Paul wouldn't hear the tremor in her voice if he didn't know her so well. "The loneliness feels like it's getting worse, even though I have Mikey and Lincoln, LJ and my dad. I still feel so _alone_. Except when I'm with you."

He decides it would be better for both of them if he didn't read anything into that. "Hey, what are friends for, right?" It's neutral, rhetorical – something he's _supposed_ to say. Paul Kellerman is pretty pleased with himself.

Sara doesn't understand her disappointment. "Can I ask you a favor, as a friend?"

"Anything," he prompts, all blue eyes and innocence. Well, _mostly_ innocence.

"Will you stay with me tonight?" She watches him cock his head in that way peculiar just to him; interested, but cautious – trying to work out what she's _really_ asking. "I know how that sounds, but I don't mean…"

"No, I know. On the couch, no sex." He smirks like it's an old joke between them.

Sara clutches the beer bottle between her hands. "I don't sleep very well. Lately, I pop a couple of pills with a glass of wine. And I watched my mother do that every day until –"

"You're not your mother, Sara." He puts an arm around her. "And I will stay over."

"Just for tonight."

"Just for tonight," he echoes, like he wouldn't have it any other way.

* * *

After twenty minutes on Sara's couch he's _never_ sleeping over again. The thing is a pain in the ass and the back and the side. It's almost 2am before he starts to doze off and then he's being woken by Michael Jr. calling for his mother.

Paul scrambles off the couch, the blanket twisting around his feet and tripping him up. He reaches out to break his fall, misjudging the distance in the dark, badly. His forehead smacks into the sharp wood edge of the furniture. _Mother_f –! He stays kneeled there for a moment, the pain so excruciating he almost wishes he'd passed out. And then Chicken's wet nose is nuzzling his face.

Getting to his feet, Paul presses the heel of his hand to his hairline. It comes away smudged with blood. _Damnit_. Climbing the stairs two at a time, he reaches the landing just as Sara is emerging from her son's room.

"What happened?" is the first thing he asks her, his voice a tense whisper. "Is Michael okay?"

"He's…" _Fine,_ Sara starts to say. She sees that he's bleeding and moves closer. "What happened to you?"

"Your furniture is conspiring to kill me."

"What?"

"Nothing." _Not_ nothing. "I heard Mikey, I was worried… I tripped." She frowns at him in that stern, maternal way of hers. He should be more careful. He should make more sense. "Look, I'm fine. What happened with Mikey?"

"He's working on his fear of the dark." Sara pulls his hand away so that she can examine the wound. "He wanted me to turn off his nightlight."

"He couldn't do it himself?"

"He's _five,_ Paul. He still thinks there's a monster under his bed. As soon as he deals with the dark, he'll deal with the monster. That's his plan." _He always has a plan, just like his father_. "You're lucky you don't need stitches. Let's get you patched up."

He doesn't argue with her. He doesn't want to, truth be told, so he follows her to her bedroom and sits on the edge of the bed she shared with Michael. She emerges from the en suite with a first aid kit, her hair tucked behind her ears. She grew it out again and Paul wants to thread his hands through it and kiss her so bad that it hurts. Or maybe it's the sting of the disinfectant.

He feels vulnerable like this, with her, and he wants to tell her a secret, confess something. "I'm still in love you."

She looks at him peculiarly. "Why do I need a new couch?"

And Paul realizes what he's _really_ said.

"I love that couch. Michael and I used to –" Eat, sleep, watch TV, do crosswords, make love – they _lived_ on that couch. She stops. The same fond memories that have brought a long-lost smile to her face, steal it away. _Used to. Lived._

"I'm sorry," Paul begins, "I shouldn't have –"

"No, it's just a couch. A stupid _fucking_ couch! It doesn't…" She tries to get a handle on herself. It's not Paul she's angry at. If Michael were here she'd yell at him. And then she'd hug him and never let him go. Sara stares at the blood-stained absorbent cotton in her hands. Michael's nosebleed on the pillowcase. "Have you ever loved someone so much that every little thing reminds you of them?"

"No." He should say something more. _"I hate that Michael got sick. I hate that you feel this way. If I could've traded places with him, Sara, I would've."_ The last part is bullshit, but Paul likes to believe it. It would comfort her. Except Sara's never needed comforting except years ago, in a moment of weakness, and – as it turned out – all she really needed was a cup of coffee and kick in the ass.

"That's what I like about you, Paul," Sara says. "You're nothing like him. You don't remind me of him at all."

It's a backhanded compliment – an insult, even – but it takes more than that to hurt Paul Kellerman's feelings. Besides, this is _Sara_. His whole relationship with her is based on a weird combination of secrets, hard feelings and unrequited love.

"You're right," he says. "It's just a stupid fucking couch. A really uncomfortable one that I'm not sleeping on. You want me to spend the night, fine, but I'm spending it right here, on this bed, with you."

He asked her to marry him, once. Stupid fucking idea. Sara threw him out of her life and didn't speak to him for a long time. He imagines that history is about to repeat itself.

He imagines a lot of things, none of which happen next.

To be continued…


End file.
